


I'm Rude, She's Ginger

by Beckymonster



Category: Torchwood, Zero Dark Thirty (2013)
Genre: A/U, Fluff and Crack, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-08-24
Updated: 2013-08-24
Packaged: 2017-12-24 12:41:31
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,344
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/940134
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Beckymonster/pseuds/Beckymonster
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>On her way back to D.C. after the mission, Maya receives a proposition</p>
            </blockquote>





	I'm Rude, She's Ginger

**Author's Note:**

> My thanks to RiverWoman for looking this over for me, wrangling the bits that needed wrangling and for not thinking I was utterly insane for having his crackpot idea. Also remaining mistakes are mine and mine alone.

It was the firm hand at her shoulder that eventually woke Maya from the fitful doze she'd fallen into. In front of her stood the pilot who had greeted her when she had boarded. 

“Sorry to disturb you, Ma’am” the pilot said, his voice strangely quiet. It was only then that she realised that he was actually speaking normally. The great plane’s engines were silent. “We’ve just landed for a fuel stop, thought you might want to stretch your legs?” 

She shook the sleep from her head as she unbuckled herself from the rudimentary chair. 

“Where are we?” she asked, standing up; wondering what she would see if she glanced out of the window. Would it be broad daylight or the inkiness of late evening? Wherever it was, it couldn't have been that far from their starting point; the air still felt baked by the sun. 

The pilot shrugged his shoulders, “I could give you the co-ordinates if you’d like,” he said, “but we’re only going to be here long enough to fuel up before we get back into the air.”

“Thank you,” she murmured, giving him a small smile. The gesture felt strange, unpractised as if she hadn’t smiled at anyone for days or weeks. In a way, with the events of the last few days catching up with her, it felt as if she hadn’t. There was no joy in what she had done, it would not bring back the 3,000 who had died ten years before. It wouldn’t allow Jessica to return to her children, to watch them grow. All it meant was that he would not be able to order any more strikes against the Homeland. 

Standing up, she closed her eyes,raising her hands up above her head, stretching out the kinks in her spine, sighing quietly as she did so.

There would be others, just like him, but they knew their game, they knew how to play and how to beat them at it. What part would be hers to play, she didn’t know. Too soon to gather that information; to make informed decisions about anything. 

“I’m not disturbing you am I?” a vaguely familiar baritone asked out of the blue. 

Opening her eyes, Maya noticed that she wasn’t alone as she dropped her arms back to her sides, rolling her shoulders as she did so. Stood not five feet away from her was a man, who looked familiar. An assistant to the Director if she wasn’t mistaken, but what was he doing here and more importantly, what was he doing, dressed in the sort of woollen greatcoat that she’d only seen in photos from World War II?

“Can I help you?” she asked, tired as she was, it didn’t hurt to be polite. The tail of the plane was open, and bright daylight could be seen streaming in from outside. She could feel the heat pouring in from outside, but the guy standing in front of her didn’t seem to take any notice of it.  
He smiled at her, the kind of smile that was more at home in toothpaste commercials than the CIA. "Possibly," he conceded, tilting his head, but I think I could be the one helping you,"

Maya nodded. Straight to the bargaining phase, this guy worked fast. "It's Jeremy, isn't it?" she asked. They hadn't been formally introduced, but she'd paid attention, put two and two together.  
Again, that smile, "Maya, you can call me whatever you want, so long as you do!" he said with a small chuckle.

She bit down on the sigh. So he was one of 'those' guys; well, that was his problem. He should have done his homework because she wasn't a woman who fucked. Her expression, regardless of how well she schooled it, must have given something of her frustration away as his expression sobered. 

“I’m sorry, that came out wrong,” he said, his face becoming more serious. “And I hope you won’t hold it against me because I have an offer I want you to consider.” 

Maya shifted her weight and folded her arms across her chest. “Which is?” she asked neutrally.  
Despite appearances, she was listening; it didn’t mean that she’d accept what he had to offer. If there was anything to offer. She was astute enough to realise that what she had achieved, these last few days, put her into one hell of a position of power. The issue was, what to do with  
it.

“What if I told you that there are threats that are far more deadly than the one you have, pretty much, singlehandedly helped to neutralize?” he began, tone brooking no argument. “Threats that are far more insidiously dangerous that they affect not just one country but all countries of the world.” he continued. “You’ve heard whispers, the hysteria over the children in the UK a few years ago, it’s all connected.” 

Maya knew she should have simply said ‘Thank you but no thank you’ and left it at that. Regardless of the man’s ties with the Director, there was something in the words he said, his manner of speaking that led her to believe that he was, indeed, speaking the truth. Not because that’s what he believed, but it was the actual, unvarnished truth. 

“You would have to provide me with proof,” she replied evenly. 

His smile, if it was humanly possible, got wider. “You’re curious,” he replied. “good. All I ask, is that you take a week’s vacation, come visit us and see for yourself.” 

“See what?” she asked, wondering how he’d been able to pick up so quickly the fact that, despite her best intent, she was curious as to what he was talking about. 

“You’ll see,” he replied enigmatically, “All the documentation will be waiting for you when you get back to D.C.” he said as he turned to walk away from her, heading towards the tail of the plane. “All you have to do is take a week off work.” 

“I’ll think about it!” Maya called as the plane’s engines roared throatily back into life. 

“That’s what you say now!” ‘Jeremy’ replied as he jumped off the tail gate onto the tarmac below. 

* * * 

True enough, waiting for Maya, upon her return to D.C. were the travel arrangements. A first class, all expenses paid, return trip to Cardiff, Wales. 

If she was being rational, she would have thrown it in the trash and gotten on with her life but instead she decided to do as she was asked and put in for a week’s leave. After all, what harm could it do?

A week later, she found herself standing in front of a rickety, non-descript building, that had the temerity to describe itself as a ‘tourist office’ on Cardiff Bay’s quayside. It looked decidedly out of place in the smart area. Then again, many of the places she had worked in over the years had fitted a similar ascetic. 

Taking a deep breath, she opened the door and crossed the threshold. 

Standing at the counter was a young man, dressed in a suit so fine that would not look out of place on any of the Beltway bandits she’d seen while stationed in D.C. 

“f you’d like to come this way, Ma’am,” he greeted, his voice had the lovely musicality that she’d been hearing since she’d arrived in the city. 

Nodding, she followed him through the beaded curtain into a lift that descended to a cavernous room that looked like nothing else she’d seen. She couldn’t help but stare at the sheer impossibility of all - especially as she was sure that was a Pterodactyl circling around the gantries above.

“Ah, Maya!” the now familiar voice greeted her from the first floor. ‘Jeremy’ or not, Maya had done her homework before getting on the plane to Heathrow. The Director’s office had no recollection of him, no records, no personnel file, no... nothing the man was a ghost. Which for an organisation that dealt in being ghosts - was saying a lot. 

“Welcome to Torchwood.”

**Author's Note:**

> Yes, the guy in the suit is who you think it is;) Sometimes you go with canon, sometimes you go with Mori-forged chain swords.


End file.
